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It feels good to be back on blogging and here again. Winter break is here. The semester is over and I feel good.

As you may know I took Baking & Pastry Arts 2 and Culinary 2 this semester and I would like to share my experience with you.

For those of you who aren't familiar with what these classes encompass I shall tell you. Baking & Pastry Arts 2 is a five hour long class and 90% of the production is all pastries from apple products to French pastries to layered cakes to chiffon pies and a lot more.

Culinary 2 is more hands-on, creativity-driven and as if your really in a kitchen. The bad thing about Culinary 2 is that it's a six hour long class and since I took it on a Saturday I had to get up every morning at 7AM and Will would drive me to school but the good thing is when we really got into cooking and prepping food, I was really into it, we got out early, and I took this class with my professor from Culinary 1.

I recently had to visit a dessert place for a term paper I was working on for my Baking & Pastry Arts class. There were so many to choose from, but I ended up choosing Spot Dessert Bar, located in the heart of the East Village in the city.

Every time Will and I make an attempt to visit Spot Dessert Bar, it's always and I do mean always crowded. There's always a line out the door after 6PM. For our visit, we were smart to come on a Sunday afternoon and there was no line. We got seated.

I really enjoyed the rich and soothing scent of green tea lingering in the air. There was a nice, warm, cheerful, and cozy ambiance. So at Spot Dessert Bar, you can order the desserts a la carte, omakase also known as "The Ultimate Spot Experience"which costs $55.00 and it consists of six seasonal dessert tapas and one chef special, five tapas for $39.00, or three tapas for $23.00 which is a decent price.

Happy December everyone! I can't believe that 2015 is approaching near. Can you?

So it was a month ago that Will took me to a hole in the wall, food spot in Chinatown that he frequented before we started dating. I heard a lot of great things about this little food spot so Will and I finally got around to visiting it.

The restaurant is split into two stores, but one is take-out and one is dine-in. The dine-in section wasn't that big, but it's big enough. It looked very new, clean, and cozy. The waitress greeted us and took our orders and within 5 minutes our food comes out.

Will ordered one of their most famous menu items - Pork Chop over Rice ($5.00). There's a 50 cent charge for an egg, so without the egg it would be $4.50. I tried a small piece of the pork chop and it wasn't dry or overcooked which I liked. It had a slight crisp and crunch to it.

Thanksgiving came and went by quick. This year I had three Thanksgiving celebrations - one with my company, one with my family, and one with Will's family.

On Thursday, my family and I had lunch at my house and boy did we eat lots of food.

This was the Thanksgiving lunch at my house. We had a mix of Chinese food and some traditional Thanksgiving foods. My sister and brother in-law brought roasted vegetables with pine nuts, cranberry sauce, and sliced turkey with gravy sauce.

Mom cooked most of the dishes and it was delicious! I really enjoyed the turkey and the cranberry sauce that my brother in-law made. It complemented really well.
My brother in-law brought one of my favorites - strudel from Zabar's. He brought a blueberry and cheese strudel and apple strudel. I actually liked the blueberry and cheese strudel more because it added a nice creaminess to the strudel. It was really, really good.

This is the Thanksgiving dinner with Will's family. We had some Western and Eas…

So every Thursday is Food Truck Thursdays in Downtown Brooklyn, where I work. I was strolling by the MetroTech area one Thursday when I stumbled upon the Papaya King truck and glanced at their menu quickly and knew instantly what I wanted.

Yup I got a hot dog and tater tots. A very simple, but yummy lunch. I also haven't had a hot dog in so long and it was great. Next time, I must add toppings on the hot dog for sure.

A friend of mine posted on Facebook that he had tater tots as part of his dinner one night and I was blown away by it. It's been so long since I had tater tots and it was a childhood favorite, so I also had some tater tots. So full. So fattening. So yummy!

It's been about a year or so since Will and I have last been to Bassanova Ramen. We typically don't revisit ramen restaurants that we've previously been to unless their menu expanded/changed or we were unclear of how we felt the first time so we revisit it and see how we feel orwe revisit because the ramen is just that damn good.

This time we came back because their menu expanded and because our dear friend Jimmy was craving for ramen so we took him to Bassanova Ramen.

So we began with the Sizzling Hot Iron-Pan stick dumplings and the presentation of it actually surprised us because we've never seen dumplings shaped or cooked like this.The dumplings were filled with berkshire pork, chives, Chinese cabbage, garlic, and scallion. I really liked the dumplings, but I wished the the crust was crunchier.

After having dinner with our friend Draven at Ise Menkui-tei, he took us to Momofuku Milk Bar which I have been to before.

There were a lot of treats and snacks to choose from, but I took Draven's advice and got the cereal milk bar with corn flakes

Who would ever think corn flakes would complement ice cream so well? I mean really, it was amazing! I didn't eat the whole soft serve because I do have a slight allergic reaction to milk unless it's mixed in with coffee, or tea. Yeah it's weird. Milk makes me want to throw up at times, but luckily with the cereal milk soft serve I didn't really feel the reaction.

I seriously think they should have corn flakes as a topping at every ice cream shop or dessert shop. It's sweet and crunchy goodness.
Next time I return to Momofuku Milk Bar, I will probably try a different dessert or one of their special cookies.

It's been a very long time since Will and I have been to a diner. One Saturday night while we were in New Jersey, we decided to return to Coach House Diner (previous review can be found here).

It was packed with diners at Coach House the evening we went, but no matter how busy or crazy it got, our server made us extremely welcomed and happy. She had a positive attitude and was very warm to us.

I didn't order a soup so I went with the salad bar which has an array of salad toppings, pasta salads, and etc.

I ordered the Seafood Medley which consisted of shrimp, scallops, calamari, mussels, and clams sauteed in a light clam sauce.and two sides. The seafood were moist, plump, and delicious! The light clam sauce was light and had a slight wine taste to it.

There's a variety of sides to choose from, but the ones I chose was the crusty Parmesan potatoes and cauliflower au gratin. The crusty Parmesan potat…

Hi everyone! It feels good to be back on the blogging and Yelp grind. Life has been utterly busy on the offline end. Just finished my midterm and I am confident I did well, but I'll just have to wait to next week to see the results. I've studied and been loading up on coffee with an extra shot of espressos this week. I paused from blogging and yelp reviews for about two weeks and it was hard, but here I am back in action at least for now.

So here's a long overdue review, a month overdue for you. There aren't many Vietnamese restaurants in my neighborhood. There's one across the street from where I live and it's been in business for years, but there's another one that just opened up maybe two years ago called MeKong Vietnamese restaurant.

The decor and ambiance is typical Vietnamese restaurant. I was quite surprised at how spacious the restaurant was. I came on a Saturday night wi…

Will and I are normally don't find ourselves in Midtown, but not too long ago a dear friend of mine that works in Midtown, had invited me out to have dinner with him and to bring Will along too.

The three of us had dinner at Ise Menkui-tei. It's quite spacious inside especially for a ramen spot. I like that it's warm and bright inside, felt so cozy inside. The wait staff were very friendly and attentive.

So we started off with two appetizers -

We started off with the Pork Gyozas which seemed quite small compared to it's average size that I have had at other ramen/Japanese restaurants. It was moist and cooked just right. I kind of wished there was a slight crunch to the bottom part of the gyozas.

I was craving for a Grilled Squid for a long time and coincidentally this was on the menu so I ordered it. First of all, love the presentation because it's so simple yet pleasantly appealing. The grilled squ…

So, I am pretty sure by now that you all know Will and I love Vietnamese food. We've recently tried a new Vietnamese restaurant actually in Chinatown. The reason that we tried it is not only because we were hungry or that we wanted Vietnamese food, but mostly because I read an in-depth and great review of Pho Vietnam 87 on Eater NY. The beautiful photos and descriptions were convincing enough to try.

So I have this food bucket list and one of the items I've been wanting to try is Banh Xeo. It is a savory, Vietnamese pancake. When it arrived, it literally looked like a giant omelet. Inside was a combination of ground pork and shrimp and also beansprouts. It was pan-fried to sizzling crispness.

Will and I weren't quite sure how to begin eating the Banh Xeo, but somehow we figured our own way. We wrapped a small piece of the Banh Xeo in the lettuce that was provided and dipped it in the sweet fish sauce and ju…

A month ago, Will and I went out with our friends to celebrate our friend Victor's birthday. We made reservation at Maharlika and man I was pumped up and so excited to try Maharlika because it's one of the well-known Filipino restaurants in NYC and I've heard their spam fries are to die for. Yes, I said spam fries.

The decor is chic. I really liked the ambiance here. It's dim lit, trendy, laid back, and relaxing. Service is quick and on point, and the food... well it was the best part.

Our dinner began with a free small plate of Chiccaron (chicken rinds) with a vinegar sauce accompanied by very hot chili's. It was crispy and delicious and everything you would imagine if the Phillipines made an amuse bouche.

I was told by my colleague that the spam fries at Maharlika were bomb, so I couldn't pass up this opportunity. My friends and I ordered it and loved it! It had a nice crispness and the juices and fat f…